The Cruiser Bridge Model

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Offline buddroyce

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The Cruiser Bridge Model
« on: June 14, 2009, 11:06:43 PM »
I'm typically not a huge fan of single coils but I do happen to have an ESP Vintage Plus Strat with two singles and a humbucker and could never get used to the tone from the singles. That being said I was actually going to swap out the neck pickup for a DiMarzio mini humbucker like an Air Norton S for a tone I'm more familiar with and very happy with, BUT I just happened to have a Cruiser Bridge pickup laying around for some time that I bought off someone a while ago and thought.. hey I might as well give it a try.

It is honestly one of the best sounding neck pickups a guy like me could ask for. I can see why Andy Timmons likes the Cruiser so much now. Output wise it's fairly low but unlike most strat pickups it doesn't sound thin to my ears and this is coming from someone who's used to playing on fairly fat sounding humbuckers in the neck position. It's got all the clarity and sparkle one could expect from a true single coil but just a bit more umph to it.

The clean tones are fantastic with this and handles distortion very well. A mild distortion yields a great blues/rock lead tone and also produces fantastic shred tones if you crank up the gain. I'm honestly really surprised how great this pickup is and may have found a new favourite neck pickup. Too bad the one I had lying around was black. I wish they did this in white with chrome blades. (ok, I know, I can just get white covers, but the blades are still black)
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Offline CityofBlindingLights

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #1 on: June 15, 2009, 05:34:39 PM »
The Cruiser Bridge model is great for a slightly stronger strat sound, while still retaining all the bell-like clarity one would expect from a strat pickup.

And yes, it would be AWESOME if DiMarzio made silver blades on rail pickups.

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Offline wxs3

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #2 on: August 14, 2009, 10:19:52 PM »
And yes, it would be AWESOME if DiMarzio made silver blades on rail pickups.

or Gold  ....   :madness:
My first aftermarket pickup was a Super Distortion back in the 70's.  I strayed and tried Rio Grandes, Duncans, and EMGs only to come back to Dimarzio.  Funny were life takes you.

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joelmo

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #3 on: August 14, 2009, 11:43:53 PM »
hi
the cruise bridge model its something every strat player should try.
i will make them change their minds.
it is son sweet and can take a lot of distortion with muddy a little bit.
i have it on the middle position with a pro track neck and a air norton s bridge on my white mex strat called "rosita".
it will be great to have gold or silver rails like richie kotzen has on his tele.
i hope dimarzio hear us.
maybe sometimes

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Offline buddroyce

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #4 on: August 15, 2009, 04:57:12 PM »
I just got the white cover for the Cruiser I have.. it just doesn't look right to me with the black blades, but it sounds so damn good that I don't want to give it up. Maybe I'll just put back in the black cover and stick it in a Caparison Horus.
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Offline eMs

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #5 on: November 07, 2009, 01:34:52 PM »
I have a cruiser bridge in the neck of my Peavey Limited VT (VT = vintage = 3 single coils  ;D)

Clean - Amp Fender with some reverb
http://www.goear.com/listen/495f8c9/Clean-Cruiser-eMs
Same track with more bass and different amp - http://www.goear.com/listen/dd32a8c/Cruiser-CLEAN-more-bass-eMs

Mid Gain - Amp Mesa with some gain + delay
http://www.goear.com/listen/18d549d/Cru ... d-Gain-eMs

Mas gain que el anterior - Amp mesa, a little more gain + delay
http://www.goear.com/listen/9b235fd/Cru ... e-gain-eMs
« Last Edit: November 07, 2009, 02:25:40 PM by eMs »

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Offline CityofBlindingLights

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #6 on: November 09, 2009, 12:28:50 AM »
Thanks bro, +1 karma

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Offline Schneidas

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #7 on: April 13, 2010, 04:48:04 AM »
Question: would you guys use the CruiserBridge in the neck position of a Strat with 250k or 500k vol and tone controls? I'm thinking of ordering one just to try it out and see why Timmons digs it so much (his neck pickup sound is awesome). And I'll be ordering a new pickguard and vol and tone controls, not sure what values to get though. Thanks guys

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Offline CityofBlindingLights

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #8 on: April 13, 2010, 03:41:46 PM »
Question: would you guys use the CruiserBridge in the neck position of a Strat with 250k or 500k vol and tone controls? I'm thinking of ordering one just to try it out and see why Timmons digs it so much (his neck pickup sound is awesome). And I'll be ordering a new pickguard and vol and tone controls, not sure what values to get though. Thanks guys

Go with 500k. It adds a bit of shimmer to the top end.

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Women/ChildrenFirst

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #9 on: April 13, 2010, 06:30:34 PM »
I always thought that the Cruiser was made so that you could get a realistic single coil sound in an HSS or HSH guitar and have no mismatched pot values.

And Andy uses them with 500ks all around (also the reason that he went with the AT1 as opposed to the JB)

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Offline Schneidas

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #10 on: April 14, 2010, 02:23:26 AM »
Great info guys, thanks. HSS is what I'm going for with this pickup. Thinking about possible matches for the bridge. Maybe FRED, Air Zone or PAF36Bridge or even SuperD...

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oilpit

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #11 on: April 14, 2010, 12:22:03 PM »
Why not jut go allout and put an AT1 in there?

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Offline Schneidas

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #12 on: April 14, 2010, 06:06:31 PM »
Yeah, I could do that aswell. Didn't even occur to me. Althoguh I'm not trying to emulate AT's tone...

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oilpit

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #13 on: April 14, 2010, 09:11:41 PM »
Althoguh I'm not trying to emulate AT's tone...


Well you should be  :madness:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBVFcPoCdlk

Sparkling clean to THE FATTEST distorted tone I have ever heard...

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Offline wxs3

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Re: The Cruiser Bridge Model
« Reply #14 on: April 16, 2010, 08:56:21 AM »
I want to add that if you wire the Cruiser Bridge in the neck in parallel that you get an almost hs-3 / hs-4 type of tone under gain.  I really like it wired this way.
My first aftermarket pickup was a Super Distortion back in the 70's.  I strayed and tried Rio Grandes, Duncans, and EMGs only to come back to Dimarzio.  Funny were life takes you.